Wait until you see the next one. It’s worse (although keep an eye out for a Mrs Flood/Anita Dobson appearance).
Seinfeld
Wow. A lot, really, to unpack here, and I had no idea when we started watching it, that our finishing this show would coincide with a Jerry Seinfeld “comeback” attempt, but here we are.
For starters, had you mentioned to me that Seinfeld ended in, say, 2009, I would’ve believed you. I completely forgot that it ended well before the Clinton Presidency did, which isn’t something that is common with me - I generally have a good memory for these things.
Regardless, Seinfeld holds up very well. There are a few moments where the technology has left the story in the dust - there’s one sequence where Elaine is constantly hearing fax machine/modem dial-up noises every time her phone rings, stuff like that - but that sort of thing didn’t happen very often.
I don’t buy current Jerry saying that our world is too “woke” for Seinfeld - to be fair, I found the show to be kind of tame by current standards, a nice throwback to a time of network censorship where a long-running joke about masturbation would not be anywhere near as crude as what we would get today. And, holy hell, his standup is as anodyne as could be - why is Jerry Seinfeld, of all people, getting mad about silly made-up shit like “woke”? Doesn’t he realize he is Jerry Seinfeld?
We wondered why they stopped doing the standup bits at the beginning and end of the show (starting with season 8) - did Jerry stop doing the act? Did he realize that none of them were really all that funny? Enquiring minds want to know!
I asked Inna: “Do you think that Jerry is a good person?” We had quite the debate as she saw him as a basically typical guy who was there to react to his crazy friends’ doings, while I saw the character as far more morally flawed than she did - to me, Jerry was completely unsympathetic and, at times, just plain sociopathic.
A lot of memories, though. Catch phrases that I still use today that I completely forgot were Seinfeld-isms (“Heeelllloooooooooo” being one of them).
We could tell when they were running out of steam - sometime around season 7, especially by season 8 they started introducing (and relying on) a series of side characters, with Elaine’s boyfriend, Putty (played by Patrick Warburton), being the most common. The situations started becoming more silly - Kramer and Newton running a bunch of return bottles to Michigan for $.05 each was pretty bad - and by the end of season 9, you could tell there was a sense of exhaustion from everyone involved: I thought the “Frogger” and the “Puerto Rican Day Parade” episodes (the last two episodes prior to the clip show + finale) were extremely weak when I first saw them, and they did not impress upon the latest viewing.
Anyway, if you liked it the first time, give it another shot.
I had massively high hopes for Russel T, but why he would start the new season with a concept as dumb as Space Babies is beyond me.
I was not a fan of that one.
I mean Bill Clinton was president for most of the time Seinfeld was on. But I see you mean it ended before George W. Bush became president.
I think of Seinfeld as a very 90’s show. It ran almost the entire length of the 90’s and kind of helped define it.
Thanks for the correction, fixed.
We’re very familiar with the show, as we kept the boxed set in the RV along with Flight of the Conchords and The Larry Sanders Show. All three were our go-to entertainment when bored or rained in, and never failed to make us laugh. Seinfeld is an admittedly flawed personality and was basically playing himself on the show. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that he’s somewhere on the ADHD spectrum or even autistic. But he worked “clean” and his schtick resonated at the time.
For sidesplitting funny, though, I’ll take Larry Sanders. Pre-“me too” Jeffrey Tambor was hysterically funny throughout all six seasons.
Neither of those are among my favourites, but Peter Stormare as Slippery Pete was great, IMO.
I once saw an interview with Seinfeld in which he said he can never stop looking for material, and that it’s basically a curse to not be able to experience even the most mundane thing without turning it into a bit in his head.
Me too? I thought his main thing was verbal abuse to Jessica Walter.
They were so funny together on Arrested Development, it was unfortunate to learn he blew up at her during filming. It was probably both actor’s best and now most iconic role.
Perhaps so; my memory is a bit foggy on it.
Tambor was fired from Transparent over sexual harassment claims. There were also the allegations that he verbally harassed Jessica Walter on Arrested Development. I enjoyed his work going all the way back to Three’s Company, too bad he turned out to be such a turd.
We powered through the first couple of episodes of Shogun and we started enjoying it more once we figured out who the characters are and what they’re trying to do. Still a couple of episodes left to go.
It was lot more dull than expected. I think of it as “Slowgun” now and it was disappointing.
Fallout was great, though.
As someone who didn’t watch them at the time, I watched them in bulk (and many times since), and while season 8 and 9 seemed different they still have some of my favourites, such as Bizarro Jerry, Little Kicks, English Patient (god did I hate that movie), The yadda yadda, Serenity now and the Betrayal.
For the record, it’s “Puddy”. I thought his character was hilarious. Yeah, that’s right.
Elaine: Is it a problem that I’m not religious?
Puddy: Not for me.
Elaine: Why not?
Puddy: I’m not the one going to hell.
Good stuff.
I liked Puddy as well and I think Seinfeld went off the air at the right time. Season 9 was not bad, but even Jerry realized the whole thing was just about over and you should leave while the show is still wanted. They offered Jerry a lot to continue, but they left at just about the right moment.
X-files has to be the obvious answer of a show that did not leave at the right moment. Season 7 should have been the end, but Chris Carter envisioned it continuing on even without Mulder AND Scully, so he kept it going and tried to introduce leads that could take over after Gillian Anderson eventually left.
Should Seinfeld have ended after season 8? Maybe. Did season 9 tarnish the show? Not for me.
The finale? Lame. I can barely count it as a proper episode.
Huh. Inna loved the finale, said it made a lot of sense. But then, she’s an expert in Russian literature, a form of expression where people rarely win at the end, so not surprised she had that reaction.
Then you may be interested in the Patrick Warburton led show Rules of Engagement, which ran for seven seasons. He effectively plays an older married Puddy without the religion. Even David Spade is funny in it too.
Did you see the Curb Your Enthusiasm finale? I thought that was brilliant.